Monday, September 22, 2008

I found this to be a very obnoxious comic. It's entirely saying "hey people, look at this way in which I am better than you." It's especially dumb because if you think about it, what is a ringing sound for a cell phone? There are rings that sound like old landline phones, but those are uncommon and weird. Is he really saying he never uses standard ringtones? Why is that something to be proud of?

Anyway, I just find it very self righteous and not something I imagine many readers will identify with, and if you don't recognize some aspect of truth in something then it will never be funny.

The decline of ringing in today's society actually sort of . . . I wouldn't say it bothers me. But my cell phone ring is now a really low-quality clip from "Incommunicado" by Harvey Danger. That just isn't a ring. It is like phones are slowly moving away from the idea of actually ringing in such a way that it sounds like a phone.

So I found this one vaguely amusing.

Actually the place where I've really most noticed it is in movies. Movies, no matter how high tech, almost never have the cool, musical ring tones in them unless it is for comic effect. How long will they be able to get away with this?

Also, I don't think real phone ringtones are all that uncommon. However they do annoy the hell out of some people who think that a landline phone is ringing- I personally think it's pretty funny, but it's still annoying to people. Makes me wonder what kind of old-timey tel-e-phone chime Randall's got on his.

I insisted that my friend record a ringtone that was just me saying the words "Ring ring ring!" It is a continual sadness in my life that I have yet to own a phone where I can record my own ringtone; it would totally be that.

I will read it and comment. I saw it only briefly but I have a feeling I will dislike it, just cause it seems like one of those "ooh I don't really know about this topic but I am going to pretend" things.

lol My roommate has the weirdest ringtones. I think she recorded a lot of them herself: her texts come in as a really long burp (or a ribbit, I can't really tell), and her calls come in as "Pick up the phone! (nicely) I know you're there!" and then progressively gets more and more deep and demanding.

It wasn't until months later when I came back to this comic that I realized it was an attempt to mirror the style of asofterworld.

It failed. In fact, it didn't even get the typical ASW panel pattern right (two or more of the panels are from the same photo zoomed in to the same degree, whereas all three of these panels are zoomed in differently). Plus, it's fucking pretentious, whereas ASW tends to be more about the quirky personalities in life. I'm not sure how accurate a description that is, because it is really hard to summarize the style of an entire comic, especially ASW, at 3 in the morning.

What the hell is this?

Welcome. This is a website called XKCD SUCKS which is about the webcomic xkcd and why we think it sucks. My name is Carl and I used to write about it all the time, then I stopped because I went insane, and now other people write about it all the time. I forget their names. The posts still seem to be coming regularly, but many of the structural elements - like all the stuff in this lefthand pane - are a bit outdated. What can I say? Insane, etc.

I started this site because it had been clear to me for a while that xkcd is no longer a great webcomic (though it once was). Alas, many of its fans are too caught up in the faux-nerd culture that xkcd is a part of, and can't bring themselves to admit that the comic, at this point, is terrible. While I still like a new comic on occasion, I feel that more and more of them need the Iron Finger of Mockery knowingly pointed at them. This used to be called "XKCD: Overrated", but then it fell from just being overrated to being just horrible. Thus, xkcd sucks.

Here is a comic about me that Ann made. It is my favorite thing in the world.

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